Serious risk of catching Covid in four counties as Ireland's rates spike

Waterford, Carlow, Kerry and Longford have seen their coronavirus rates rocket in the last fortnight.

The latest 14-day incidence rate data was released by the HSE on Tuesday and it makes for grim reading for the whole country.

The national rate stands at 667.2 cases per 100,000 population - a rise of nearly 300 cases per 100,000 in just one month.

Here are the worst rates in the country.

Waterford - 1261.0 cases per 100,000 people

A whopping 771 confirmed new cases were recorded in Waterford in the last seven days leading up to Halloween.

That number rises to 1,465 if you add in the previous seven days before that, leaving the Munster county with the highest Covid-19 rate on the island.

This is a staggering fact when you consider that the home of the blaa also has the highest rate of vaccination in Ireland.

One in every 33 people you meet in the county will have caught the virus in the last two weeks.

Carlow - 1210.2 cases per 100,000 people

Although Carlow's overall incidence rate is lower than Waterford's, the lower population means that one in every 20 or so people will have tested positive for the virus in the county at the moment.

The five-day moving average for the Midlands county stands at 50, but there have been nearly 700 new cases in the last fortnight.

Testing for Covid-19 with a mouth swab (Stephen Collins/Collins Photos)

Longford - 1191.5 cases per 100,000 people

Longford, like a lot of other counties, has struggled to contain the virus ever since it first came to these shores in March 2020.

The Leinster county has consistently been high in incidence rate tables and the latest update is no different.

Officials will be concerned by the rise in the last fortnight and will want to see improvement.

Kerry - 1050.1 cases per 100,000 people

At one stage, Kerry was the blueprint for how to deal with Covid-19. Now, it is one of the worst-hit areas.

Only two other counties recorded more positive Covid-19 test results in the last 14 days than in the Kingdom.

One of them was Dublin, the other was Cork - the two highest-populated regions in the country.

The full list can be seen in the latest HSE data report here.